The Finale
by wildhoneychild
Summary: Alternate ending to Zero Day. Cal and Andre are at a crossroads and must make a difficult choice.


The shrill wailing of distant police sirens reached Andre Kriegman's ears as he crouched down on the library floor, balancing himself on the heels of his dirty combat boots. He glanced around the room and saw spreading patterns of dark crimson blood slowly seeping into the beige carpet. It was eerily quiet, and the air around him felt heavy and stifling. No more screaming or crying, no more pleading, no more gunshots. Just complete stillness in that moment. He could see limbs askew, poking out from under the tables, from a dozen lifeless bodies, and took a moment to absorb the scene, his eyes wide and heart pounding.

Andre's hands were trembling so badly that he had to set down his shotgun - Melaina, he'd affectionately named it - by his feet and steady himself. "Jesus," he whispered in awe, sucking in a breath through his clenched teeth. "Fuck. _Fuck!_ "

Adrenaline was coursing through his body and he almost couldn't believe it was really happening. It felt like a dream. It was finally Zero Day, the day he'd been planning and anticipating for months, the day that would forever go down in history, the single greatest highlight of his life. He felt more powerful than God.

He looked over at Cal Gabriel, his best friend, his partner in crime, the other half of their tightly unified Army of Two. Andre was overcome with emotion and pride at how it had all come together so perfectly, and how they were finally putting their plan into effect. It overwhelmed him how strongly he felt about Cal, as if no one in the world could understand him the way he did or share a connection as deep as theirs. No one, he felt, could reach the same caliber as them. It was as if they'd been two halves of the same lost soul, thrust together by the universe to fulfill the most important mission he could imagine.

Andre was beaming from ear to ear. Cal appeared more subdued and contemplative.

"Do you see this?" Andre asked, his voice shaking slightly with nervous energy. He gestured grandly around the room at all of the carnage and destruction they had caused. "This is what we've been dreaming about for _so long!_ Isn't it fucking great?"

Cal wore a stunned expression on his face. "Yeah," he replied distractedly. He took a few pacing strides as he peeked under a table and studied the dead body of a short boy wearing a Metallica tour T-shirt, probably a freshman, sprawled out on his stomach with half of his head blown off. "Damn. It's one thing to imagine killing someone, but it's something else to see it and feel it in real life." He nudged the boy with his foot, then made a disgusted face as he stared at the gory stain of brain matter beneath him. "It's actually pretty gross, right?"

Andre burst out laughing. "Yeah, it is. Kinda reminds me of shooting watermelons with Chris. Only a hundred times more exciting."

"Mmhmm. Watermelons don't beg for their lives." Cal slung his gun over his shoulder and continued walking around aimlessly, examining the bodies. He walked across a sea of scattered blood-soaked books and papers, kicked aside someone's backpack, and stepped over the bullet-ridden arm of a blond girl with a now-unrecognizable face, chuckling dryly to himself as he noticed she was clutching the golden cross hanging around her neck.

"I mean," he continued. "When I imagined killing people, I guess I pictured it a little differently. I wasn't thinking about just how fucking _messy_ it is."

"Me neither," Andre agreed. "They can't recreate this shit in a video game. And I sort of figured I'd just kill a bunch of those fuckos and run off." He took pleasure in tallying up his body count, but didn't get off on messing around with decaying corpses. He wasn't a psycho, after all.

The sirens got louder as they approached the school. Andre got to his feet and took a quick look out the window as the parking lot filled with emergency vehicles. He grabbed his shotgun and reloaded as quickly as he could. "Okay. Focus. Let's get it together. Ready for round two?"

Cal didn't reply, and Andre continued, too excited to notice his friend's silence. "Let's take out some of those cops, man. Then we can head downstairs and go around to some of the classrooms, picking off those little fucktards one by one."

"Andre."

"It's gonna be fucking beautiful. I bet they're like sitting ducks in there crammed under the desks, all crying and pissing their pants. I can't wait to see it."

" _Andre_ ," Cal repeated firmly.

He finally turned his head. "What?"

"I'm done."

Andre scoffed in disbelief. "What? What the fuck are you talking about, 'you're done'? We've only just gotten started, man."

"I mean, I'm done, Andre. I don't want to do it anymore." Cal shrugged his shoulders in resignation, and ran his fingers through his hair with a sigh. He didn't look sad or scared, just extraordinarily tired.

Andre found himself at a loss for words, and struggled to understand. "Don't tell me you're, like... regretting it or something."

"No, I don't regret it," Cal assured him. "But I did what I came here to do. I wanted to make my mark on the world and then leave. Go out with a bang, right? Look around you, everyone in here is dead. Don't you think we've made a mark already?"

"Well, yeah, but it could be so much _bigger_ ," Andre insisted. "We could set a new record. Why do we have to stop here?"

"Look, I... I never wanted to go around killing hundreds of people, Andre. That was always your idea. I just wanted to take out enough to set off a reaction and trust that other people are going to pick up where we left off, and then I would be ready to die." Cal paused, then declared with certainty, "Well, I think it's my time now. I think I'm ready."

Andre was quiet for a minute. It suddenly dawned on him that every time they'd been fine-tuning their plans and he'd brought up the idea of escaping and going on the run, setting off a bunch of Zero Days at other schools and leaving a path of destruction across the country, Cal had never quite shared his enthusiasm, instead just shrugging noncommittally and giving one-word answers until Andre moved on from the subject. He also supposed that he, too, always knew deep down that his grandiose schemes were unrealistic and the only real outcome of Zero Day would be the two of them leaving the school in matching body bags. He just never liked to put much thought into that part.

A deep, booming voice outside crackled over a megaphone, interrupting his concentration. "Andre, Calvin, come out with your hands up. We can work this out, boys. No one else needs to get hurt."

Andre snapped and shot at the window three times in rapid succession. "Fuck you!" He was unfocused and he knew his aim was off, and he hadn't hit anyone. "Do they think we're fuckin' retarded or something?" he hissed under his breath.

"I'm done, Andre," Cal repeated. "And so are you. We don't have much time before the cops break in and storm the building. Wouldn't you rather die by your own hand then be shot to death by them?"

He just nodded in defeat, the sobering reality finally sinking in. "Yeah... Yeah. You're right. I guess we should get it over with, then."

"Yeah," Cal echoed. He took a seat on the floor next to Andre, their backs pressed up against the wall beneath the window. The boys got their guns ready, embracing their final moments. "You ready?"

"Wait, wait," Andre objected. "How are we going to do this?"

"What do you mean?"

"The counting. We're going to count to three, right? Is it one-two-bang, or one-two-three-bang?"

Cal gave him a perplexed look. "I don't know. I guess one-two-three-bang."

"Okay." Andre chewed on his lip and fidgeted nervously with his gun, trying to will himself to go through with it. Cal looked at him out of the corner of his eye, and he gave him a slight nod.

"Alright then. One..."

Andre thought of his parents, and felt a faint twinge of guilt and sorrow for them. They didn't deserve to have a mass murderer for a son. They didn't deserve the vitriol they were about to get, the blame showered upon them for somehow causing this, for being bad parents and raising him to be a monster. He knew they were the best goddamn parents he could've hoped for. He'd never wanted for anything. It wasn't their fault that he'd fucked up. _Good wombs hath born bad sons._

A vision popped into his head of them finding out he was dead, of them at his funeral, of his mother collapsing in anguish and weeping inconsolably, of his father utterly numb with grief.

"Two..."

"WAIT!" Andre interrupted.

"What's wrong?"

"I can't... I can't do this," he stammered, feeling pathetic. "I'm so scared."

Cal wasn't annoyed or upset. He tried to figure out what was going on. "What are you worried about? Are you afraid it's going to hurt? Because it won't. It'll all be over in half a second. That's all it takes, and then just... darkness. Peace." He didn't bother to try to comfort him with fantasies of an afterlife. Neither of them believed in it, and even if there was one, they had no illusions that they'd be going to heaven. The best possible outcome, they figured, was simply ceasing to exist in this shitty world.

"I mean, you had to know that it was going to happen this way, right?"

Andre didn't respond. He didn't have to say anything more. They both knew that he had made his mind up.

"Okay," Cal exhaled. "Alright. It's alright. It's going to be fine."

There had been so many times when Andre had been the voice of wisdom, his knowledge seemingly limitless and his dedication to Zero Day unshakable. Andre was the one who'd come up with most of their plan of action, because he just knew more and was indisputably better at taking charge. If Cal had any hesitations about it, Andre was always by his side, talking him off the ledge and strengthening his resolve. Andre had been the rock he'd counted on for so long. Cal figured he could do the same in his best friend's moment of weakness.

An uncomfortable tension filled the air, and both boys turned their bodies away from each other, lost in introspection. Cal thought of Rachel, smiling sweetly at him and looking radiant in her prom dress. He thought of her right now, crammed under one of the desks in her art classroom, and hoped she wasn't too scared. Andre simply racked his brain trying to plan their next move.

"Andre?"

"Yeah?"

Cal turned to face him again, gazing at him seriously with his big blue eyes. He reached out and put his hand on Andre's arm. Andre glanced at it, surprised at his friend's uncharacteristic display of affection. "I meant what I said in the car, about how grateful I am that I met you. Thanks for everything, really." He paused for a second, biting his lip in concentration. "I'm sorry, man."

Then in one swift movement, Cal grabbed his shotgun with both hands, put his lips around the barrel, squeezed his eyes shut, and pulled the trigger just as Andre instinctively screamed out, "No!" In an instant, the gun went off, blood spattered all over the wall, and Cal immediately toppled backward.

Andre felt all the air leave his body. His vision went blurry and there was a deafening, disorienting ringing in his ears. He felt himself gasp and start to weep involuntarily as he stared in horror at his best friend lying on the ground, twitching for a few seconds and then going still. He leaned over Cal's body, shaking his head in disbelief and feeling hot tears roll down his cheeks as he grabbed Cal's shoulders and shook him futilely.

He was gone. How?

In a blind rage, Andre leapt up and fired his gun out the window several more times without really looking. This time, the police didn't hesitate on returning fire, and he was quickly clipped by two bullets in the shoulder. He cried out and dove to the ground as searing pain quickly spread through his left arm. His eyes darted to the wound, gripping his arm with his right hand and watching his blood spill out and trickle onto the ground. A sudden wave of dizziness and nausea came over him.

Within a few moments, he heard a cacophony of splintering wood and shattering glass behind him, followed by several sets of heavy footsteps. He knew the cops were here, and looked up in time to see ten men in protective SWAT gear carefully pointing assault rifles at him. He fumbled around on the ground and slowly, weakly moved to lift his shotgun.

"Drop it, _now_!" barked one of the men. "This is your only warning!"

Andre just blinked up at them, feeling like a scared child and becoming hyper-aware of his own labored breath and his heart pounding in his ears. Seconds started ticking past like hours. His hands remained clasped loosely around the stock of his gun, but he didn't try to raise it. He could have made one last ditch effort to fight them off, but he knew it was a suicide mission. If he made any sudden moves, he'd be sprayed with bullets before he could pull the trigger.

More importantly, he didn't want to anymore.

Cal was dead, and all of the fight was gone from him.

After another long moment of deliberation, Andre finally set the gun down, kicked it away from him, and raised his hands in the air in surrender. Immediately, they were on top of him, grabbing his gun and roughly cuffing his hands behind his back. They pulled him to his feet as he coughed and winced in pain, and hurried him out of the library. He turned his head and got one last long look at Cal, his heart sinking in his chest with grief. He felt like such a coward for not going through with it, for leaving his best friend to die alone. He'd never imagined Zero Day would end like this. He hadn't accounted for the possibility of him losing his nerve and not having the balls to face his own death.

Andre struggled to keep his footing, his knees nearly giving out. He was dragged through the hallway, past a series of darkened classrooms under lockdown, with broken glass crunching under his feet and fire alarms blaring above his head. He felt like he was in a dream. An officer read him his Miranda rights, but the words were drowned out in his head, and he only gave a half-hearted nod in response when they asked if he understood.

They shoved open the double doors of the school's side entrance, and were instantly met with an enormous crowd of people all yelling at once. Andre squinted uncomfortably in the bright sunlight. There were news crews in the fray rapidly snapping photos and following him with their heavy cameras as they recorded him being escorted away, reporters shouting questions over one another and struggling to push past police barriers to get as close to the crime scene as possible. In the midst of a small fleet of emergency response vehicles, one ambulance had its doors open and ready, and Andre was hastily pulled into the back, flanked by two SWAT agents, still heavily armed and keeping him under close surveillance. They laid him down on the cot and ensured his arms were restrained as a stoic paramedic moved quickly to get the bleeding under control. The back doors slammed shut, muffling the commotion outside, and the ambulance sped off.

The world around him started to blur together, and the overlapping voices turned into background noise. Andre closed his eyes and a snapshot of Cal's smiling face flashed in his mind, two words playing on repeat as he began to lose consciousness.

 _I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry._


End file.
